


Tonight is All We Have

by Dernhelm



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Angry Sex, Angst, Arguing, Cheating, F/M, Love, Mass Effect 3, Mass Effect 3: Citadel, Multiple Endings, Reconciliation, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-11
Updated: 2014-06-11
Packaged: 2018-01-27 02:36:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,633
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1711844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dernhelm/pseuds/Dernhelm
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Shepard has always been good at making decisions, except when it comes to her own heart. When a friendly dinner with her ex takes an intimate turn, Shepard must decide if she wants to mend the past or bury it behind her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this while playing the Citadel DLC, after it had been over a year since completing ME3. I regretted having broken up with Kaidan and romancing Laira instead, but it was too late to change it in-game. I decided to write a little choose-your-own-ending fic to let myself play with the possibility of reconciliation--or not--with Kaidan at that late stage in the game.

“Wow.”

“Yeah.”

That…that wasn’t supposed to happen, was it?”

“Nope,” Shepard sighed. She sat up on the couch, grimacing as her sweaty skin unpeeled from the leather. It had seemed so damn sexy at the time: the slick surface on her bare flesh, the earthy, animal smell mingling with the human salt of desire. Now it just felt uncomfortable, itchy, and she wanted to put as much distance as possible between her and it…

And the person still laying on it.

 Shepard didn’t look as she groped for her clothes discarded on the floor. Her fingers had just grazed over the mound of her shirt when a warm hand closed over her wrist, firm and insistent. Her muscles tensed, ready to pull away.

“Hey.” It was a simple word, but there was so much packed into it: confusion, care, desire, imploring. Perhaps even a hint of anger.

Shepard finally turned around, and forced herself to meet Kaidan’s hazel eyes. They reflected everything his one word had held, and even more: hints of their shared past, fragile hope for an uncertain future. It tore at Shepard’s already conflicted heart.

Shepard swallowed hard, shifting her gaze down to Kaidan’s swollen lips, then following the path of small red circles trailing down his neck and across his chest. She had not been gentle when she had kissed him, relishing the masculine physique carved through years of Alliance training and hard-fought battles. He’d become even tougher, stronger—more forceful—since she’d last bedded him. So different from Thane, who had been all lean muscles and sleek scales, tentative touches and gentle exploration. Or Liara, who was so smooth, soft, womanly—

Oh God. What was she going to tell Liara?

“Shepard,” Kaidan said softly, almost pleadingly, “say something.”

Shepard swallowed hard. What could she say? That it had been the beer and whiskey and nostalgia that had turned a friendly dinner in her new apartment into sweaty, passionate affair in her living room? That the second Kaidan’s lips had crushed into hers, she had been flooded with a mix of harsh regret and surging desire, a bittersweet cocktail almost as addictive as the Hallex she’d dabbled with in her youth? That she wished it had never happened? That she wished it would happen again?

“I don’t know what to say,” she finally admitted. She tugged gently, yet firmly against Kaidan’s grip on her wrist. He hesitated only a second before letting go. She didn’t reach for her clothes, though, instead bringing her hand up to brush her fingertips against the center of Kaidan’s bare chest. His skin was warm, almost feverish, still damp with exertion, and she slowly traced the red lines of his new scars. Scars he’d earned saving her life.

Kaidan surprised her by pushing her hand away. “Say what you’re thinking. That this was a great trip down memory lane, but you need me to leave.”  He sat up, wincing as his back peeled off the couch.

Shepard opened her mouth to protest, and then shut it again. That was what she should say, wasn’t it? She had ended things with Kaidan weeks ago, when he had made it clear that his skepticism of her past ties with Cerberus wasn’t going to change any time soon, that his faith in her had been shaken by her very existence. She couldn’t be with someone like that, who didn’t trust her one hundred percent. She had enough doubt and fear in her life to have to deal with it from her lover.

That’s why she’d chosen Liara in the end. Liara, who had risked life, limb, and sanity to bring Shepard back from the dead. Liara, who had transformed from a shy, sweet scientist into a formidable underworld player and biotic warrior. Liara, whose smile reminded Shepard of the “good old days” aboard the first _Normandy_ , when everything had been so simple—before Cerberus, before the Reapers—and Shepard had been alive and whole and herself, and it had been her and Joker and Garrus and Wrex and Ash and Tali and Kaidan…Kaidan…Kaidan…

“Don’t,” Shepard whispered, the word catching in her constricting throat.

“Don’t what?” Kaidan grated. His eyes narrowed, and he refused to look at Shepard. He busied himself with sorting through the tangle of discarded clothes at their feet. “Don’t tell it like it is? I’m not a fool, Shepard, and this isn’t the first time I’ve made this mistake—”

“Don’t go.”

Kaidan stopped. He was just as surprised as her to hear the quiet words that had crossed her lips. Panic welled in Shepard’s chest, her heart hammering as hard as if she were in the middle of a firefight. That would be better than this. A firefight, she knew how to deal with; navigating the treacherous minefield of her emotions…that she wasn’t so good at. If she was being honest with herself, though—truly, deeply honest—then she’d admit that she’d spoken the truth: she didn’t want Kaidan to leave. Not yet.

Kaidan’s eyes shone, reflecting the golden firelight from the grate at the center of the room. God, Shepard had missed those eyes, so warm, so…so human.  

“Why am I here, Shepard?” Kaidan asked quietly. “Why did you invite me over tonight?”

“You’re the one who wanted to come over and cook me dinner.” Shepard tried a smile. She hoped it didn’t look as shaky as it felt.

Kaidan cocked his head, his lips pursing in annoyance at her evasion. Shepard swallowed hard, thinking. Why had she invited Kaidan over? True, she’d been spending time with all the members of the _Normandy_ crew while they were on shore leave, and it would have been rude to exclude Kaidan from that list. But, she could have insisted they go out somewhere public, go to the casino or blow off some steam in the Arena. Something easy—and impersonal—an attempt at friendship rather than this sloppy, headlong dive back into intimacy.

 “I’ve missed you, Kaidan,” Shepard admitted. “More than anyone else, you remind me who I was, where I come from, what I’m fighting for.”

Kaidan’s lips tightened slightly. “Not who you are now?”

Shepard looked away. Her gaze drifted around Anderson’s luxurious apartment, a landscape as alien to her as the topography of a new planet. It was almost more so, since it was supposed to be hers now. Even with the new furniture, it felt like she was borrowing it. It was a habitat worthy of the hero of the galaxy, not some orphaned street kid who’d fought her way out of one of the worst Earth slums and up the Alliance ranks. Not someone who had made the choices—and mistakes—that she had.

_Like cheating on the woman you said you loved._

“I don’t know who I am now,” Shepard said.

“If it makes you feel any better, I don’t either,” Kaidan said carefully.

“Don’t know who _you_ are, or who _I_ am?” The corner of Shepard’s lip quirked up into the barest hint of a smile.

Kaidan gave a little snort, shaking his head. “Both. Ever since Cerberus brought you back, I’ve been trying to figure you out,” he confessed.

“There’s honestly not much to figure out.” Shepard felt her frustration rising. Cerberus, always with Cerberus. “I was dead. Cerberus brought me back. I fought the Collectors. Now I’m fighting the Reapers and Cerberus. I’m always fighting something.”

“Is that why you’re fighting me?”

Shepard was taken aback. “You’re the one who keeps pushing at me! You’re always second-guessing my motives, wondering if I’m a Cerberus sleeper agent, questioning my loyalty.”

She didn’t care if she was just in her underwear, she had to move. She pushed herself off the couch and stalked towards the bar. Behind her, she could hear Kaidan standing, rifling with his clothes, zipping up his pants.

“Loyalty?” Kaidan finally said. “I’m not the one who turned to a Drell Assassin as soon as I came back to life, am I?”

Shepard’s hand slipped as she poured the drink, sloshing whiskey onto the polished surface. She barely noticed, she was so blinded by the sudden surge of mixed emotions welling up in her.

It had only been a few days since Thane’s memorial service, since she’d watched the tender messages he’d left behind for her, and his loss was raw once more. She struggled with her thoughts, her memories. _Thane, be alive with me tonight._ What had happened between Thane and her was none of Kaidan’s business, but, perhaps, after everything they’d been through, she owed Kaidan a degree of honesty. Perhaps it’d even feel good to talk about Thane.

“I won’t lie,” Shepard said slowly, “Thane was…very special to me. We met at a time when we both needed someone to turn to. His illness was advancing, and I had just…just been brought back. We had both lost so much: family, friends, lovers.”

“Lovers?” As usual, Kaidan’s curiosity got the best of his tact.

“Thane’s wife was murdered, years ago. A retaliation killing,” Shepard explained slowly. Her hand was shaking slightly as it wrapped around the glass, remembering the brutal story, the pain in Thane’s black eyes as he shared his darkest pain with her.

“I…I didn’t realize.” Kaidan’s tone verged on the apologetic.

“Didn’t realize what?” She turned, needing to see the look on his face.

Kaidan stood, bare-chested, his shirt hanging slack and forgotten in his hand. He licked his lips, contemplative. “That he was a widower. It…it makes it better, somehow.”

Shepard narrowed her eyes, acid words already forming on her tongue. Kaidan saw her expression, and raised his hand defensively.

“I don’t mean that I’m glad for his loss, not at all,” he stammered. He looked down at his shirt as if it were the most interesting thing in the room, and shrugged his broad shoulders. “It just makes it easier to know that…that you weren’t his first love, too, I guess.”

Heat flushed through Shepard as her heart did a flip in her chest. God, she hadn’t seen this side of Kaidan in so long: the earnestness, the cautious honesty. It was part of what had drawn her to him in the first place, and what made it hard to stay away now.

Shepard took a long drink from her glass, the whiskey burning a clean line down her throat, dampening the fire of her memories of Thane. Those were private, for her alone. 

“We’d both lost the person we first loved,” she said. “It’s part of what drew us together. He was there for me when no one else was.”

“I could have been there for you.” Kaidan’s voice was soft, sincere.

Rather than soothe her, though, his tone touched the red nerve throbbing inside her, enflaming her own pain, her own sadness.

“You turned your back on me,” she said, each word cold and deliberate. “I came rushing to Horizon, terrified that the Collectors had taken you, and the first thing you did when I found you alive was tell me how you could never trust me. What was I supposed to do with that?” She put her empty glass down on the bar firmly, the hard clink echoing through the cavernous room.

Kaidan had the grace to look abashed. “I admit it, I didn’t handle it very well—”

“You handled it horribly. I’d spent weeks, months, thinking of how I was going to find you again, and when I did—”

“Alright!” Kaidan snapped, cutting off Shepard. “I fucked it up! I’m sorry! It doesn’t mean you need to keep punishing me!”

Shepard cocked her head, incredulous. “Excuse me, did you say I’m punishing you?”

“First you say you want us to work out, then you say you don’t. Next thing I know you’re with Liara of all people—”

Protective anger surged through Shepard. “You leave her out of this!”

Kaidan raised his hands defensively, though his expression remained severe. “I’m not the one who threw her as shield between us as soon as we were about to patch things up! And I have to say, it’s really messed up, Shepard. She’s a sweet girl, and she doesn’t deserve you using her like this.”

Fury surged through Shepard, and she pushed herself away from the bar, storming the last few steps to Kaidan to close the gap between them. Her mouth opened, arguments loaded on her tongue. How _dare_ Kaidan accuse her of using Liara to get back at him!

Options: 

[Paragon: "You're right, Kaidan..."](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1711844/chapters/3645359)

[Renegade: [Punch Kaidan]](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1711844/chapters/3645374)


	2. Paragon: Hope for the Future

She saw his face. Something she’d never seen before, a bright, fragile sheen on the edges of his eyes, raw openness practically spilling out of the liquid hazel. She was sucked into the galaxy in his irises, into the swirling blue and brown and green and gold. Those colors, the colors she’d ached to see again when she’d been lying sleepless in her bed on the new _Normandy_ , staring up at the countless stars slipping past her skylight.

She still loved him. God help her, she still loved Kaidan.

“I’m here now, Shepard,” Kaidan said. His voice quavered slightly. “But I won’t be here tomorrow. Not unless you ask me to be. “

Shepard’s heart squeezed so hard it became difficult to breathe. He was standing so close she could smell herself on his skin, the intoxicating musk of their joining. It smelled so _right_ , her scent entwined with his. She reached up to touch his chest again, but her fingers stopped just before they connected, her hand falling to her side. If she touched his skin again she would be lost. She needed to think, to decide.

“Why are you here, Kaidan?” She asked, softly.

“To cook you dinner?” It was his turn to evade, and he licked his bottom lip nervously.

“Seriously. How can you say that you still want to be with me when tell me you can’t trust me? Can’t believe in me?”

“I never said I didn’t believe in you, Shepard,” Kaidan said. His eyes pierced hers, and the force of their intensity stole her breath anew. “Even if this doesn’t work out between us, I will always believe in you.”

“Then why—”

“Maybe you’re not the only one throwing up shields,” Kaidan blurted. His eyes darted away again. “Do you…do you know how hard this has been for me? You were dead, Shepard. _Dead!_ For two years! And I…I left you…left you there on the _Normandy_ …”

Kaidan’s words trailed off, his hand coming up to cover his mouth. The sheen around his eyes brightened, and Shepard impulsively reached out to comfort him. He recoiled, though, out of her reach, dropping his hand as he swallowed hard, struggling to master his emotions.

“I gave you a direct order—” Shepard started.

“That’s no excuse!” Kaidan shouted, finally losing the battle for control. Crackling biotic energy wreathed his entire body, and a web of blue engulfed the empty whiskey glass beside her. The tumbler shook, then soared across the room to explode against the stone wall in a burst of glass shards and dissipating cobalt energy. 

“Kaidan!”

“I should have disobeyed!” Kaidan snarled, ignoring Shepard’s shock. “I would’ve rather been court-martialed! Stripped of my rank and dishonorably discharged!” Another glass rose from behind the bar, hanging for a second before flying into the same wall with a hideous crash. “I would’ve rather spent the rest of my life in the brig!” A third glass flew into the wall, adding to the jagged wreckage.

Kaidan finally sagged, the biotic energy dissolving from his skin. He looked up at Shepard with haunted eyes, and when he spoke, his words were as brittle as shattered glass. “I would have died at your side, rather than lived knowing that I left you to die alone.”

The knot in Shepard’s throat loosened just enough to let a single, sharp sob escape. She hadn’t even realized she’d started crying, just as she was barely aware of her movements as she closed the distance between them. She swooped him up in her arms, and he let her this time, his own arms coming up to embrace her in kind.

They held each other for what felt like an eternity. They didn’t speak, letting their tears and caresses express the deep aching darkness that had plagued them both for so long, the fears and doubts that had kept them apart.

“I’m here now, Kaidan,” Shepard finally said when she could speak again, “I’m here now.”

“What about tomorrow?”

Shepard squeezed her eyes shut, and held him even closer. She wanted to promise him tomorrow, the next day, and every day after it. But it wasn’t that simple. It was never that simple for her.

“There may not be a tomorrow for any of us,” Shepard said slowly.

“I don’t believe that,” Kaidan said, pulling Shepard away just enough so he could meet her eyes. “Not for a second. We’re going to push these Reaper bastards back into the black hell they crawled out of!”

Shepard gave him a feeble smile, bolstered by his conviction.

“I believe in you, Shepard,” he said, “I trust in you, in _us_. I can prove it to you, make it up to you, if you’ll just give me another chance.”

Shepard felt as if she were being torn in two. She loved Kaidan, so very, very much. But, she loved Liara as well, differently, but just as powerfully. How could she break Liara’s heart so soon after it had been entrusted to her?

And truly, did it matter in the end? Despite Kaidan’s optimism, Shepard couldn’t shake the deep, aching certainty that this was well and truly the end of life as the galaxy had known it. Even if the Reapers could be stopped, nothing would be the same. So much had been lost already, whole planets destroyed, millennia-old civilizations reduced to dust. This was not the time for promises.

This was a time for hope.

She knew what she had to say.

“Alright,” she said softly. “Alright, we’ll give this another shot.”

Kaidan’s smile was so bright it outshone the red and gold of the Silver Sun Strip swirling outside her picture windows. It made what she had to say next all the harder.

“After we win this.”

Kaidan’s smile faded. “Shepard, I—”

“I love you, Kaidan,” Shepard said quickly, taking his hand, “and I want to be with you now and tomorrow and always. But, do you really think now is the best time to break up with Liara? She’s just witnessed the fall of Thessia, she’s working night and day gathering intel for the final battle…she’s not showing it, but she’s really fragile right now.”

“And you need her at her best,” Kaidan said quietly, finishing Shepard’s train of thought.

“I need you all at your best.” She could tell by his expression that Kaidan didn’t like this, one bit, but he understood.  “You were right, she doesn’t deserve to be used this,” Shepard sighed, “she deserves to be with someone who is going to love her with all their heart. But right now...”

“…she needs to believe that she is.” Kaidan said sadly. “Poor girl.”

“That girl is 77 years older than me,” Shepard mused. She swallowed hard, thinking of the earnest love shining from Liara’s youthful face. Four decades older or no, Kaidan wasn’t too far from the mark. Liara was a practically a girl by Asari standards. This would be hard on her. Hard on them both.

“Is that…is that going to be enough for you?” Shepard asked, hating the uncertainty in her voice. “I can’t give you tomorrow. But I can give you the future.” _I hope._

“I’ll be honest. It’s not exactly what I wanted to hear,” Kaidan said slowly. He reached up, and cupped Shepard’s face tenderly, giving her a little half smile. “But, if it means that one day soon I can say that you are well and truly mine, then it’s good enough for me.”

“I am yours, Kaidan,” Shepard put her hand over his, pressing it harder into her face. “You just have to share me for a little while longer. You’re already used to doing that.”

“Not like this,” he admitted, swallowing hard. “This…this is going to be hard to go along with.”

“I know. It will be for me, too.”

 Shepard pulled his hand off her cheek, but didn’t let it go. She squeezed it tight.

“Well, you don’t have to share me right now,” she said with a smile, “and I can give you tonight. Just you and me.”

“Just you and me,” Kaidan echoed, “you have no idea how much I love the sound of that.”

“Me too,” Shepard said softly.

She tugged him gently towards the stairs. There was a bed with soft sheets up there waiting for them, no sticky leather sofa needed. There was no skylight above it, but if things continued as they had been, she knew Kaidan would give her one hell of a star show.

“I should clean up,” Kaidan said, sheepishly nodding towards the shattered glass strewn in the corner.

“Later.” Shepard pulled more insistently on his hand. “If tonight is all we have, then I don’t want to waste a second of it.”

“For now,” Kaidan said. Shepard noted the effort it took him to believe his words. “Tonight is all we have for now.”

Shepard nodded, letting herself believe in Kaidan’s hope, too. She had to have something to cling to, some dream to see her through the coming darkness. Even if everything came to ruin and the galaxy came crashing down around her, she would die knowing that she had finally forgiven Kaidan, had embraced the truth of their love.

And nothing—not even the Reapers—could take that from her.


	3. Renegade: Bury the Past

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter contains sexually explicit content.

Shepard’s fist flew towards Kaidan’s jaw before she could stop herself. Luckily, Kaidan’s reflexes were as sharp as his words, and he deflected her punch easily. He twisted his arm, trapping her wrist in his hand, and pulled her even closer.

The light in his eyes blazed hotter, wilder, and Shepard was suddenly hyper-aware of his hard, bare chest pressing against her, his skin still scented with their mingled sweat. Her anger morphed into something raw, primal, burning from the core of her, and she bit down the sudden urge to snarl at him.

Kaidan leaned forward, and for a moment, Shepard was sure he was going to try to kiss her again, and she would have to decide whether to let him, or to turn away. However, he stopped with his face an inch from hers, gorgeous in its fury, in its pain.

“Admit it. All you’ve ever wanted was to fuck me,” Kaidan said slowly, deliberately, “you can’t stand the idea of letting me in.”

That dark, primitive place welled up, bubbling right under the surface of her skin. No one had ever made her feel like this, not Thane, not Liara. Before she could stop herself, before she could think, she cupped her hand over Kaidan’s crotch, squeezing the growing hardness. He grunted, eyes widening.

“I’ve let you in, Kaidan,” Shepard said, her voice low and smoky, “and I’m going to let you in again right now.”

A flurry of emotions swirled across Kaidan’s face: confusion, disgust, desire. For a moment, Shepard was sure that Kaidan was going to push her way, call her on doing exactly what he was accusing her of—using sex as a stand-in for real intimacy—until his lips slammed into her with the force of a bullet.

They didn’t bother with the couch this time; Kaidan simply pushed her up onto one of the bar stools. Shepard wrapped her legs around his hips, groaning impatiently as she fumbled with his fly. It only took a few moments, and before she knew it, he was inside her again, hard and urgent and familiar.

For one brief moment, she thought of Liara, but her guilt was swallowed by the joy of being filled once more by Kaidan. Kaidan, who she had opened her soul to so many years ago, who had made her laugh, who had given her hope. Kaidan, who  Shepard had looked for, pined for, and who had broken her heart so thoroughly on Horizon. Kaidan, who inflamed her flesh and ignited her soul, who made her feel as close to whole as she had since she’d been brought back to life.

Sudden heat welled at the corners of her eyes, and she fought it by focusing on the moment. She looked up at Kaidan’s face, hoping to anchor herself with his passion. Instead, she was shocked by the hard set of his jaw, the cold sheen in his gaze as he stared vacantly over her shoulder. Realization stabbed through her like a lance of ice: this wasn't desire, this was anger.

This was good-bye.

It was the last straw. The tears she’d been fighting began to fall. She couldn’t let him see them. Oh no. It would be too much, too intimate. Instead, she clung to him even tighter, writhed all the harder. If this would be the last time with Kaidan, then she would make it count. She bit into his shoulder, making him grunt. It thrilled her, sending her closer to the edge.

“Harder,” Kaidan ordered. It surprised her. Kaidan had never been one for pain. “Bite harder!”  He repeated, more forcefully.

Shepard complied, sinking her teeth into his flesh. Kaidan hissed, moved all the more vigorously. She did it again, and again, and each time Kaidan rewarded for her efforts. She was balanced on the razor's edge of sweet oblivion, and finally unable to stand anymore, she bit down as hard as she dared. Kaidan howled, part in pain, part in rapture as he let go of his tenuous grip on that edge, pulling Shepard down with him in a moaning, throbbing tangle into the core of sweet, utter oblivion.

When it was over, Shepard clung to Kaidan for a moment longer. She knew as soon as they uncoupled, he would quietly finish dressing, turn around, and walk out the door forever. True, she would see him on the Normandy, but that would be Major Alenko, fellow Spectre and comrade-in-arms. Once she let go, though, she would never see this Kaidan again.

Which was what she wanted, wasn’t it?

He pressed a soft kiss to her shoulder before pulling away, not looking at her, not saying anything. He didn’t need to.

_I love you, Kaidan,_ Shepard wanted to whisper. _I always have, always will._ Her lips remained firmly shut, though, her truth trapped behind fear, behind confusion, behind regret. They had history together, too much history. No matter how much she wanted to pretend otherwise, she was a different Shepard than the one who had fallen in love with Kaidan years ago. There was no going back.

This Shepard couldn’t belong to one man. She belonged to the galaxy now.

She watched him dress in silence, noting the marks on his shoulder. She wondered if they would scar. _Yet more scars earned in my service._

When he turned to go, he stopped, lips parting as if on the verge of confession. But then, he shut his mouth and squared his shoulders, and walked out the door.

She picked up her glass, still slippery from the spilled liquor. It burned a clean line down to her stomach, masking some emotions, heightening others. She needed a shower. A long, hot one. Then sleep. Tomorrow, she’d figure out exactly what she was going to say to Liara. Honesty, of some sort. Honesty that Shepard wasn’t capable of giving to herself…or of giving to Kaidan.

_Good-bye._


End file.
